American Taliban and All

The new order of the GOP has truly and entirely lost what little mind they had remaining. I say this without tongue in cheek but in all seriousness and with not some little fear for the safety of anyone ‘not like them’. Like so many others I use to sit back and shake my head in wonderment and not some small amount of amusement at the foolishness of those who would follow these ignorant and arrogant little men through the gates of hell.

Yes, I said it and I do not consider it hyperbole. These preachers and their minions in the GOP, the ones who suck up to them for votes, who seek their endorsement, who slide through the muck bobbing their heads at the most outrageous vitriol; they are our worst nightmare. We should be pointing our fingers and screaming from the highest mountaintops, ‘Terrorist’. Instead, we point from the sidelines and laugh, ‘Clown’ or ‘sideshow freak’. We fail to understand these ‘sideshow freaks’ have a following, their words have power, elected members of Congress agree with them, candidates for President line up for their endorsement.

Why aren’t we afraid? Why aren’t we scared to death when preachers call for the death of citizens of this nation whose only fault is to be born with a different sexual orientation from the majority, from what is considered ‘normal’.

Why are we not afraid when elected officials and those who would be President pander to these delusional and angry Biblical literalist, scream ‘Death to the homosexuals’ and are followed on the stage by Bobby Jindal, Mike Huckabee or Ted Cruz? Oddly, most of the videos for National Religious Liberty Conference in which Pastor Kevin Swanson suggests killing all Homosexuals, have disappeared. I found a snippet of one though, this one is the only one I could find after searching hard and having to listening to manic ravings.

We giggle behind our hands when one of the front runners of the GOP presidential primaries writes he stabbed a classmate, beat another with a lock and lifted a hammer against his own mother; but it is all okay now because he was saved by God. Of course, all this is likely a lie written to make his story more compelling, more readable and more sellable. We, the malleable and forgiving Left, we shake our heads and say, ‘well he was a child, he was redeemed’, on the Right of course, it is ‘God saved him, we love him’. Now, that he wants to be President and his story is being vetted and none of it is true, not one word, he is crying foul, his pathology is being discovered but according to him the ‘liberal media’ is out to get him and no candidate in history has ever been more vetted than him. In the meantime, we simply sit back and giggle at the sideshow.

Another front runner is a bully, a narcissist, a xenophobe and an outright racist. What do we do? We create humorous memes about his hair, we protest his appearance on SNL. We speak in whispers about his bad behavior, but secretly we cheer him on, hoping he will be the GOP nominee because in our asinine thinking we can beat him hands down. He has no real experience, who would elect him, right? Yet history tells another story, we sit on our asses at election time, we turn away and fail to go to the polls. Our nation has been on a downward spiral to hell since 1981, because we were taken in by celebrity, despite a lack of experience, fundamental knowledge or an understanding of economics or international geopolitical influences or even the basics of diplomacy, we have gone from a first nation to tipping into third nation. Yet, here we are again thirty-five years later another ‘celebrity’ in the running this one full of ignorance and bluster and the party of know-not-a-fucking-thing is touting him as the next best thing.

The rest of the clown car, help me please to not lean to heavily on my cornucopia of foul language to describe this horrifying group of baseless cowards. Yes, cowards. They will say anything and do anything to rile up those who don’t know they are being flim-flamed. Tragedy? We got that covered, just look what the lovelies on the right are doing with Paris, if those victims had guns they wouldn’t be dead, here for your viewing pleasure just a few of the many quotes from the Right side of Hell in America;

Imagine a theater with 10 or 15 citizens with concealed carry permits. We live in an age when evil men have to be killed by good people

“I want to tell you something else – it is what goes through my mind,” he continued. “I bet it goes through your mind – thank God for the Second Amendment. Thank God for the Second Amendment or we’d be Europe. We would all be disarmed. You know Obama and Hillary, all of the Democrats, most of the Republicans. There would be no NRA. There would be no groups trying to protect us. Thank God for the Founding Fathers, the framers of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. Thanks God because you see this going on – these poor people who were slaughtered going to a sporting event or a restaurant or a concert or potentially a shopping mall — slaughtered as they stand there by these animals, by these barbarians – and none of them are armed, none of them.”

— Mark Levin, Radio Show November 13, 2015

They will say and do anything to stoke the fires of hate and fear, in a population who are certain their life is worse today than it was yesterday and simply need a target to blame it on. Well hell, why not blame it on ……

That is just the smallest of lists of who the GOP points to when they want to get the base jumped up. It is good enough though, isn’t it? The GOP moves further and further to the right. Never mind talking policy that matters. Never mind talking about the Economy and how we are going to fix what remains broken, let’s instead talk about fantasy football and fantastical new tax policies, everything from Biblical based tithing systems to tax forms that will fit on the back of a post card and eliminating the IRS. Never mind, we have a nation to run and infrastructure to fix, which is just the tip of the iceberg.

Haven’t we been here before? Haven’t we seen this before?

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I can only say, we should be afraid. We should in fact be scared to death. We should be fighting mad. We should be standing up, pointing our fingers and demanding better of both our elected officials and those who would be the President of the United States of America. That we are not doing so says we simply don’t give a damn, this saddens me more than I can possibly measure.

I get fired up only because there is so much wrong in the world today, so much we should care about and should do something about. Meantime, our politicians those elected and those who would be elected, talk and fling BS.

Powerful post, Valentine. You got it out of your system – that’s good. But, you’re “preaching to the choir.” Is that the right phrase? I wonder if there are readers of your blog who believe that shit that the GOPers are spouting on that stage and all over the media. I myself called them “clowns” not so long ago. Now, they are not so funny!

I tweeted it and used your tags as hashtags. Certainly deserves repeating. Hope it helps. I have more followers on there (@sunshinebriteFL) than I do on my blog. I totally agree with every word on your post. ~Carol

The funny bone in all of this, is that the old republican establishment are also pulling their hair out wondering how over 50% of their primary voters are supportive for the likes of Donald Trump and Dr. Ben Carson. This is what happens when you go to bed with the crazies.

You know, I’ve been so busy laughing at all the stupid shit the GOP and its ilk says that I’ve never considered how terrifying it is that there is a whole flock of idiots drinking that shit up and believing every word they say. Maybe I should move to Denmark.

It absolutely astonishes me that hate has become the mantra of the GOP. Hate gays. Hate blacks. Hate immigrants. Hate Muslims. Hate whomever doesn’t look/talk/act just like you. (And hate folks who know the difference between who and whom, less and fewer … you know, the smart folks) I dance between fear for what is to come and a firm belief that what I fear couldn’t possibly happen and then I remember thing just that about Ronald Reagan, who not only became prez but became a fucking saint.

I wouldn’t say “afraid”, but “very concerned”, but I agree with your post. I do think that Trump has a good chance of winning the nomination and then would have a decent shot at the White House, too. But he’s really no worse and no better than most of the rest of the field, as most of them are either card-carrying members of the Christian Taliban or a wholly owned subsidiaries of the top 0.1%, or often both.

Excellent post! Every word rings true. I have been on this planet a number of years, have lived in this nation through WW2 and the others that followed from time to time, but never have I been this frightened for our future.The intelligent politicians need to step up. The thinking people of our nation need to make a stand. Where are they?

Yes, yes it does. It seems there is nothing so low some won’t stoop to capitalize on it. I am trying hard not to tear my hair out, or worse punch some that I love in the throat to make them stop talking.